


Kwyjibo

by chellerrific



Category: Greek and Roman Mythology, Heroes of Olympus - Rick Riordan, Percy Jackson and the Olympians - Rick Riordan
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-08-24
Updated: 2011-08-24
Packaged: 2017-10-29 06:11:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 434
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/316639
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chellerrific/pseuds/chellerrific
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Yes, he had crushed her heart and soul time and time again. But that didn’t mean he didn’t <i>love</i> her.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Kwyjibo

**Author's Note:**

  * For [skypirateb](https://archiveofourown.org/users/skypirateb/gifts).



> Set early-ish in the time frame of _The Lost Hero_. For Philippa, written during Dissertation-a-thon 2011.

Zeus went to sleep in an empty bed for the first time since he could remember, his heart aching over Hera’s disappearance in ways he neither could nor would ever articulate.

Everyone had seen the change: he had shut down Olympus and he was more paranoid and temperamental than ever. No one even dared make jokes about blue balls, not even Dionysus, whom Zeus could tell at times _really_ wanted to.

It would not have been against his nature to take someone else to bed during this time—Ganymede refilled his cup eagerly, clearly ready to be the one that filled that position (and many others)—but in all honesty, the thought never even occurred to him. He would try to explain this later, once things were back to normal, and was met only with incredulity. No one really seemed to understand just how much her kidnapping broke him.

Yes, he was a player. Or rather, he was _the_ player. Yes, he would sleep with anything that moved, and some things that didn’t, and flaunt it. Yes, he had crushed her heart and soul time and time again. But that didn’t mean he didn’t _love_ her.

In fact, he thought “love” might be the wrong word for what he and Hera had. It was certainly part of it, but he felt it didn’t really do their relationship justice. (Zeus had tried to get Hermes to invent a word for it once; his son came back with “kwyjibo” and thought himself hilariously clever.) They were a part of each other. Not in that sappy “better half” way, that was a load of crap. They had four thousand years of history going for them; Hallmark card platitudes did not do them any kind of justice and in fact were rather insulting. Hera was like oxygen to him. In fact, being with her was even more necessary than breathing, as he didn’t really _need_ to do the latter to survive. He needed Hera though.

He turned to look at her throne, she wasn’t there.

He reached across the bed, she wasn’t there.

He took a breath, she wasn’t there.

Every waking moment he was conscious of her absence, like a void that followed him everywhere. It didn’t exactly make him sad. It made him ache, certainly, but mostly it just made him really _fucking_ pissed. He was fucking _Zeus_ for crying out loud. Nothing should trip him up this much, and _nobody_ should be capable of causing him this kind of anguish.

But she could. And whoever had taken her could. And somebody was going to pay.


End file.
